UK commercial conglomerate Amazon has further bolstered its sports streaming offering, increasing its coverage of international rugby union with the Autumn Nations Series.
Of the 20 games featured in the Series – taking place in October and November – 17 will be streamed across the group’s Amazon Prime Video platform and will include all of the England, Scotland, Wales, France and Italy fixtures.
Commenting on Amazon’s renewal of its Autumn internationals rights, Ben Morel, Chief Executive of the Six Nations, said: “We are delighted to be working with Prime Video again for the broadcast of the Autumn Nations Series. They were a fantastic partner last year and we share the same ambition to establish an exciting series that fans will engage with and enjoy.
“We have worked closely with all our unions to agree a schedule of fixtures, that minimises overlaps making it possible for supporters in UK and Ireland to watch every single match from the home teams in a series that will showcase the best teams in the northern hemisphere against the best teams in the southern hemisphere, with Argentina, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa all featuring.”
The Autumn Nations series will kick off on 30 October, with Scotland hosting Tonga at Edinburgh’s Murrayfield Stadium.
Although fixtures involving Ireland will be shown by Channel 4 in the UK and public broadcaster RTE in the Republic of Ireland, the Irish Rugby Football Union (IRFU) has confirmed that Amazon Prime will provide coverage of the national team’s matches next year.
The agreement builds on Amazon’s previous broadcasting of rugby union, having first agreed to stream the Autumn Nations Cup last year, the same year the tournament made its debut after being created due to the COVID-19 pandemic leading to the postponement of numerous international fixtures.
Jeff Besos’ firm has also expressed interest in providing coverage of the English Rugby Premiership, and Bill Sweeney, Chief Executive of the Rugby Football Union (RFU), noted that the Six Nations tournament could one day be broadcast by the company.
